“They threw my clothes and furniture out from my home. I had nowhere to live but in my car and nothing to eat. My head was spinning – where to go, what to do?”

Only 10 days after the Spirit of 76 initiative was celebrated in Washington, D.C., one of our bright and talented African activists was deliberately targeted by his government for retaliation. His crime: He attended the International AIDS Conference and was sponsored by St. Paul’s Foundation here in San Diego.

SAN DIEGO -- The Rev. Canon Albert Ogle and St. Paul's Foundation for International Reconciliation will be honored with the Pride in Action Award at Equality California's 2012 San Diego Equality Awards.

Superintendent Bill Kowba and the San Diego Unified School District (SDUSD) will be bestowed with the Equality California Leadership Award.

Gay actor Wilson Cruz ("My So-Called Life" and "Noah's Arc") will host the affair from 4 to 7 pm Saturday, Aug. 25, at the home of Joyce Rowland and Pamela Morgan in the Rancho Santa Fe community of San Diego. Leftover Cuties will provide the music.

They clambered over Washington monuments taking photos of each other. Smiling, hugging their new- found friends to post on Facebook and share with their network of LGBT activists. First the White House, then the Jefferson Memorial and finally they came to the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial for the first time. There they were, dwarfed between the monument’s two solid slabs of stone that frame the Potomac’s shimmering horizon. These are our 26 “authentic witnesses” from countries where it is still illegal to be LGBT.

Last week, Bishop Christopher Senyonjo and I had an opportunity to relax in the home of Tim and Michael, two dear friends in Minnetonka, Minn. We had been on the road fighting for global equality for two weeks, so it was a time to do laundry, have lunch with my partner Mile (as he changed planes on his way to Europe to visit his family) and give some support to the local campaign for marriage equality.

We were interviewed by KFAI Radio and shared some of the background of the anti-LGBT campaign in Africa.